December 1978

“Like what?’ I asked. was parroting. She had programmed “Well, you have to take care of her brain to think of herself intellecyour patients,” she said. tually as an alcoholic; but at the gut “Sure, 1 have to take care of my level, where it really counts, she patients,” I agreed. “But I’m not never felt she was an alcoholic. Her Something’s going to be operating on anyone. All 1’11 be doing is talking to them, and guts had never relinquished the misconception that to be an alcoholic now I’m talking to you. Are you was somehow not good. Her spontelling me it’s more important that 1 sor, with many years of experience in talk to someone else rather than to the program, had been able to detect With you?” that something was lacking. “Well, you know what I mean,” This “something” is one of the she said. causes for a not-infrequent phenom- “No, 1 don’t,” 1 replied. “Not enon we see in the program: people by Abraham J. Twerski, MI) unless you tell me.” who are dry but not really sober. “Well, I think it’s wonderful that This may also be one of the main you take your time out for people reasons that some people slip after True acceptance of our disease like us,” she.said. being in the program for several “People like whom?” I asked. years. If we wish to become technical sometimes comes only after “You know what I mean,” she about it, we might even say that no we’ve been sober a while said. one ever really loses sobriety. The “Cut out that mind-reading person who relapses after several stuff,” I answered. “I know only years in the program may have been E LAINE IS a patient of mine whose okay”?” I asked. “Elaine is beaurecovery was a source of areat tiful! She’s marvelous!” pride and gratification for m e r ~ h e Her sponsor shook his head. what you tell me.” “Well, I think it’s great that you’ve taken your time out for us abstinent from alcohol, but may never have attained sobriety. Like Elaine, this person may have was an executive’s wife, a woman in “Nope, doc,” he said. “Something’s dregs of humanity,” she said. mouthed “I am an alcoholic” from her mid-fifties, whose life had wrong with Elaine, and 1can’t figure At this point, I became aware of his head, but not out of his heart. become totally unmanageable due to it out. She’s doing everything by the what Elaine’s sponsor had sensed a The analysis is rather simple, and alcohol. 1 had guided Elaine through book, all right. She’s chairing, while back. Whereas Elaine was do- all comes down to the First Step: sur- I a rehabilitation program, and had leading, and attending regularly. But ing everything by the book, she had render. As long as a person feels urged her into AA. there’s something wrong there, and I not made peace with the fact that she there is something fundamentally Elaine had been sober and active don’t know what it is.” He shrugged was an alcoholic. Nor could she ac- bad about him, he cannot afford to in the program for about two years his shoulders, and so did 1. cept this as long as she was of the surrender. He cannot admit his when 1 happened to meet her spon- About two months later, Elaine opinion that to be an alcoholic was powerlessness, because his fragile sor, and 1 remarked how beautifully called me to discuss something or to be a third-rate citizen, or as she ego will not allow this. Just as the she was doing. 1 was therefore taken other, and after a few minutes on the had put it, a dreg of humanity. small child boasts of his powers aback at the sponsor’s rather deflat- phone, she apologized with “Oh, I t was evident that, although (“Look, Ma, no hands”) and tends ing comment, “Yeah, I guess she’s I’m sorry I’m keeping you so long. Elaine would get up and say, “My to demonstrate his independence doing okay.” You have more important things to name is Elaine, and 1 am an alcohol- simply because of his small stature, “What d o you mean, ‘doing do.” ic,” these were only words that she so the grown-up who feels small can-

not yield the feeling of omnipotence, bad.” Much of the work that goes and admit his powerlessness. When on in the initial phase of entering the we feel fundamentally okay about program must consist of disentanourselves as persons, it is then and gling those two ideas; the newcomer only then that we can accept our de- needs to get the feeling that he is pendence on others and on a higher really, fundamentally, a fine person, power. It is only then that we can and that his inability to handle surrender and take that all-impor- alcohol should not lower his selftant First Step, without which all the esteem any more than would the inrest are meaningless. ability to take penicillin or eat I d o not believe that successful strawberries safely because of an Twelfth Step work can be done by allergy. anyone who, regardless of the length 1 think that the surrender occurof abstinence, still has the hang-up ring early on in the program is most of feeling himself to be a bad person often an intellectual surrender, and because he happens to be an alcohol- perhaps that is all that can occur iniic. Our feelings have a way of com- tially. But if surrender stops there, municating themselves to others little will have been accomplished in regardless of the words we use. In the way of personality growth. No encountering a person in need of one else can successfully look into help with a drinking problem, you our hearts and tell us whether we cannot successfully deliver the have progressed beyond an intellecmessage if your feeling about your- tual surrender. When we can honestself is that being an alcoholic is ly feel the same about being alcoholsomehow not good, because you are ic as we would about being allergic to then conveying this as an assessment any particular food, for example, of the other person as well. When the and when we feel no less proud of unspoken message is “I consider ourselves as persons because of the myself to be less than the best type of existence of an alcoholism problem, person because I’m an alcoholic,” then we will have arrived. the person who receives this message Incidentally, Elaine, like many will understand that this is the way others, has made that transition. She he must feel about himself. is really a beautiful person; she is There are many who, like Elaine, really an alcoholic; and now, she get all mixed up between “Drinking knows that both of these descriptions is bad” and “Being an alcoholic is can be true at the same time.